The Top Job Sectors For 2012

Nursing and IT positions dominate the “best of” jobs list this year.

What type of work should a young person consider studying for these days? Or an older one considering a new career?

There are hundreds of choices, but sometimes it’s hard to determine which jobs out there have the best prospects for the future and the best salary and working conditions at present.

Fortunately, U.S. News & World Report has come out with its annual study on the subject. It has ranked the top 25 jobs for 2012 taking into account the prospective growth in the number of available jobs in that profession available, the current unemployment level of the position, median salary and of course job satisfaction.

Our nation is full of people from the baby boom generation reaching advanced age. It logically follows, then, that many of the publication’s 25 top jobs for the year are in the health care field. Similarly, a clear logical thread can be drawn from the spiraling pace and intensity of information technology to the numerous IT positions crowding the list.

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Three of the top five jobs are all in the medical profession. Number one atop them all is registered nurse. This is largely because (unlike other positions in medical care) the job is very expansive - after all, we find nurses everywhere in any type of medical facility - hospitals, clinics, small doctors’ practices, retirement homes, etc. This profession is expected to add over 700,000 jobs from now until 2020, while its median salary currently stands at a pleasing $64,690 and its unemployment rate is low, at around 5.5%.